Gay Erasmus is reading Jonestown

I will wait for it to appear in the Library. Meanwhile, check Erasmus’s first impressions [no longer online]. It certainly doesn’t sound boring.

I had lunch with Lord Malcolm at The Shakespeare; he is still struggling on, by the way, with all his usual courage. He told me that Piers Akerman had written a non-homophobic piece in the Telegraph. Amazed at that possibility, I said: “Oh, was it a defence of Alan Jones?” Indeed it was, so not having read it I have searched it out. I should add that Lord Malcolm is himself more than somewhat right wing on a whole range of things, but that’s OK. Except when I read the article I wondered if it was the one Malcolm referred to, but indeed it is.

Does Tim Blair still do global warming jokes?

One of the staples of uber-Right humour has been the Global Warming Joke, and Timmie has had some doozies. I wonder where they are today? Not so funny any more, is it? I am not so partisan as to suggest the Australian government doesn’t care, and some of its proposed measures are no doubt good in themselves. But their whole stand-out on the Kyoto Protocols, for all the imperfection of those protocols, is looking more and more like “lack of ticker”. NineMSN’s poll at the moment is running strongly in favour or our signing up, and the extraordinary interest shown here in my brief entry on David Suzuki further indicates what “the people” feel.

Keating: the musical

Keating! opens at the Belvoir Theatre (I live next to it, almost) on November 11, a nice irony that. I am very tempted to avail myself of my Seniors Card discount and go.

Casey Bennetto’s scathingly hilarious lyrics tear through the reign and tragic fall of the Placido Domingo of Australian politics in a production with Neil Armfield and comic satirist John Clarke blowing wind into Casey’s spinnaker.

Part French farce, part Greek tragedy, and all Australian history, “the country soul opera we had to have” transports you back to a time less politically grey as it charts the rise, fall and rise again of an antique clock collector from Bankstown.

SIGH over duets between a love-struck Cheryl and Gareth!
HISS the mean spirited ghost of Lazarus with a triple bypass!
THRILL to the spectacular settings from the plush sitting rooms of Kirribilli House to the Bankstown RSL!

Jim Belshaw’s “Confessions of a Policy Adviser - 2:Beginnings”

Jim’s personal memories are more interesting than most as he is a man who has been close to the seat of power in Canberra and, furthermore, on a part of the right-wing (centrist?) spectrum that is perhaps out of favour these days. He is also a historian and writes very well. Do go there.

Let me quote two comments from that page:

ninglun said…

This is fascinating stuff, Jim. I’ll get back to it, and refer to it, when I have finished my current sidetrack (?) into Islam and other matters.

1:27 PM, October 30, 2006

Jim Belshaw said…

Thanks, Neil.

I have, of course, been following your material on Islam and other matters. I haven’t commented because I think that you are playing a good role in disentangling issues and haven’t had anything productive to to add.

1:50 PM, October 30, 2006

I appreciate that Jim, as it has been a bit like the myth of Sisyphus over here lately. Glad someone sees what I aim to do, however inadequately. Much of what I write is in fact an attempt to find out what I know, what I still need to know, and to clarify and refine my ideas.

The importance of context revisited

NOTE: Very relevant to much that follows: Truth and Truthfulness, yesterday’s Encounter on Radio National. See also Truth and Truthfulness in Uncertain Times. The lecture on Gandhi was outstanding.

***

Well, context is in part what this entry is about. In his latest entry Deus Lo Vult performs a valuable service for all of us who have been unduly influenced by media representations of the Pope’s alleged bagging of Islam earlier this year. I stand corrected, and would encourage everyone, including the Kashmiri Nomad, to reconsider the facts as well. I say this as one who simply does not accept, and never has accepted, the primacy of Rome in the Christian church, let alone the absurd (to me) doctrine of papal infallibility. (As a Catholic priest said to me in the 1970s, Pius IX was “round the twist” when he came up with that one.) I have on the other hand a proper appreciation of the importance of the Catholic Church in the story of Western civilisation in terms of art, music, philosophy, and so much else, and respect the Church’s many good works and acknowledge its great diversity, the last being a fact many overlook.

Trying to be sane and not hysterical about Muslims…

This is not easy at the moment, and I blame both the Mufti for being such a fool, and the media for pumping up our reactions. And yes, I would hope young Muslims roundly ignore what he has to say on the subject of women, and much else besides, homosexuality not least. What qualifications do I have for any opinions on the subject? 1) I have been dealing with Muslim students for several years, and whenever I could I have tried to engage them in dialogue and discourage any and every manifestation of extremism. That also involves listening. Here is one example and here is another. 2) I have read the Qu’ran (which, much to the chagrin, indeed horror, of devout Muslims I regard as a human book, with good and bad bits in it, and a product of its time and place like any other book) and I have read more about Islam than most people I know. 3) I live around the corner from a mosque in an area dominated by Lebanese restaurants and halal Bangladeshi ones. 4) I have a number of adult friends and acquaintances who are Muslim but perfectly sane. 5) One of my cousins is married to a Lebanese Muslim.

I’ve had it with the Mufti, and with the tabloid press…

The Daily Telegraph again trivialises and distorts issues with this morning’s “Thick Sheikh” banner headline and steers firmly in the direction of Muslim bashing, which I for one strenuously avoid. The Sydney Morning Herald is more measured, but does raise issues about the Mufti that really do deserve serious attention.

In September 2005 I linked on my Blogspot blog to an article by Peter Bergen called Portrait of the Enemy. It is worth linking again in the light of information in Muslims set to dump defiant Hilaly after outbursts in today’s Herald.

Foot-in-mouth Mufti revisited…

It should be quite obvious from yesterday that I don’t agree with the Lakemba Mufti. However, after a good night’s sleep and further thought, I do have doubts about the way this story has played in much of the media, in the public imagination, in the mouth of our Prime Minister, and in the words of Pru Goward. (See Lateline.) Take today’s treatment in the Daily Telegraph, Sydney’s Fox-Murdoch tabloid:

I would venture to say that is not justified, which is not to say I agree with what the Mufti said. But listening carefully to Keysar Trad on Radio National this morning, I have to say he has a point. The message was directed late at night to older observant believers, not to the world in general; Trad admitted that much of the language was unfortunate, but the context argument does have some merit. “Who says what to whom, when, where, why and how?” is still a good analytical tool for any utterance or text, one incidentally I have been drumming into English students for a good thirty years, and it applies to The Australian, the Daily Telegraph, and Paul Sheehan, as much as to Sheikh Taj El-Din Hamid Hilaly. See also the discussion on yesterday’s PM.

Foot-in-mouth Mufti…

NOTE Make sure you also read the entry I am putting up the morning after.

Sheikh Taj El-Din Hamid Hilaly has been in Australia for over twenty years. Hard to believe then that he would be such a goose, especially today, to express himself as he did according to The Australian report Muslim leader blames women for sex attacks. It’s not the first time the Sheikh has been a goose either, and Keysar Trad is really pushing the proverbial uphill in his attempts to defend the man’s tact and common sense, at the very least: he seems to have neither, does he? For some of the to-ing and fro-ing see Muslim leader’s sexist sermon causes uproar (Radio National).

The young Muslims on Sydney’s MuslimVillage Forums start with disbelief, quite rightly pointing out that the source, a Murdoch newspaper, may be seen as tainted. The last entry (at this moment) refers us to a translation on Yahoo7*. It seems clear to me that he has recent well-publicised Sydney cases in mind when he says:

SBS Dateline with George Negus

I watched this last night, and was impressed. Dateline (Wednesdays 8.30 pm, repeated Thursdays and Mondays at 1 pm) is charting an independent course unimpressed by government spin/propaganda. There was an excellent report from Iraq, followed by an interview with journalist Paul McGeogh, but sadly not transcribed, and an up close look at the Melanesian leaders, followed by an interview with Hugh White, Professor of Strategic Studies at the ANU and also a Visiting Fellow at the Lowy Institute.

Messing with history: John Birmingham

I am reading John Birmingham’s Designated Targets (2005), the second book in the Axis of Time trilogy. I haven’t read the first, but I got into what is going on fairly quickly. “A US-led task force off Indonesia in 2021 finds itself sent back to 1942, just prior to the Battle of Midway. The novels deal with a rapidly altered version of World War II, and to a lesser extent the social changes that result amongst the Allied powers.” I find the thoughts the book generates on social change, mores and attitudes then and now, most interesting.

They’re all there: wartime PM John Curtin, Churchill, Douglas MacArthur, J. Edgar Hoover, Marilyn Monroe, even a juvenile Elvis Presley! Delicious naming of some characters too: Piers Akerman and Andrew Bolt, right-wing Australian columnists, are there as SAS demolitionists; Amanda Lohrey is a RAN intelligence officer; Prince Harry is adult and in the British military, while Philip Mountbatten is still in the Royal Navy.

It is great fun, and well researched, so long as you don’t mind your head being messed with. I must look out for the others at the library.

See Cheeseburger Gothic, John Birmingham’s blog.

Dangly bits

Thanks to all for the comments on the Alan Jones entry, especially to Jim Belshaw for his really thoughtful contributions. The past seven days now stands thus:

1. If Jones is gay, why is he so morose? 34
2. ABC to move closer to the Ministry of Truth 29
3. When obstinacy becomes reality deficit… (on Iraq) 28
4. Is Alan Jones gay? 22
5. Qiu Xiaolong Death of a Red Heroine (great book!) 19
Admiring ex-Big Brother star David Graham 19

One issue arises in Jim’s comments though, which I will address here, as Lord Malcolm has fallen ill again, I’m afraid, and you will have gathered that HIV/AIDS is the issue involved there, and he is nearing the end of his struggle though I would be far from putting a date on that given Malcolm’s talent for resurrection. People do not die of AIDS; they die of the fact that, their immune systems no longer working because of the virus, some opportunistic disease or condition overwhelms them.

Now playing: Lang Lang

There’s such a lot of dross on TV we forget what a boon the medium can be at times. It is just delightful to find a real treasure. Such was my experience just now when I happened to turn on SBS at 4pm and caught a German documentary, Lang Lang: Pianist of the Middle Kingdom.

A portrait of China’s exceptional concert pianist, Lang Lang. When he was two years old, his father spent half his annual income to buy him a piano. He started playing by ear and when he was three years old started having proper lessons. Now he is an internationally acclaimed concert pianist and is recognised for his explosive showmanship and extraordinary skill. Throughout the program, interviews with the artist are interspersed with performances from childhood to the present and ending with one where he performs a Chinese composition, accompanied by his father on a traditional monochord.

“Monochord” actually refers to that most beautiful of instruments, the erhu (pronounced arr-hoo). God, what a pianist, and what a personality!

Boys from the Bush

This was the subject of an inspirational episode of Message Stick tonight. There will be a transcript there after Monday. Meanwhile, check the Boys from the Bush website.

The Boys From the Bush Program is an enterprise-based behaviour modification program for 12-20 year old indigenous youth in Cape York and the Torres Strait devised by Milton James.

It operates in partnership with the Community Justice Groups under the auspices of the Cape York Land Council and Cape York Partnerships.

This socio-economic program uses business enterprises as the means of breaking the unemployment / welfare dependent / ignorance / apathy / boredom / drug and alcohol abuse and crime cycle.

The enterprise is also used as a means of assisting young participants with the transition from boyhood to manhood, as well as from play to work.

Admiring ex-Big Brother star David Graham

I have never bothered with Big Brother, which I regard as pure swill. Nor am I a card-carrying National Party supporter. However, I am unreserved in my admiration for Young Nationals federal membership officer and ex-Big Brother star David Graham for his courageous stand reported in this week’s Star Observer.